Tell a friend about this book...

This sensitively written novel presents the moving story of a young man's passion for an older woman. It begins when Agnes Vale takes a temporary teaching post at a boys' school in southern England. In this enclosed, monastic environment, her warmth and femininity have a considerable impact on both the masters and the boys. She in turn is int... more »rigued by her pupils, particularly by eleven-year-old Goff Willoughby, a handsome, accomplished boy from a distinguished family, and by his cynical and wordly Greek friend Andrew Karistides.

Later, staidly married and living nearby, Agnes encounters Goff again. Now the brooding, athletic youth is determined to make a mistress of the former teacher he has always idolized. Her head filled with lush images from pre-Raphaelite poetry and painting, Agnes refuses to see the dangers in the adolescent boy's growing obsession until its true nature is dramatically brought home to her.

The years pass and the scenes shift to London and to Spain as Agnes, now a successful children's author, attempts to escape from Goff and from her own feelings. Closely observed by the sardonic Karistides, the affair moves toward the tragic conclusion which was foreshadowed in the idyllic cirdumstances of its beginning.

Eugenie Hill has tackled the literary cliche of the young man/older woman and has made of it a heartbreaking tale of erotic enchantment. And her remarkable novel illuminates a shattering side of such an affair which will surprise the reader.« less